Suomi – alcohol abuse

This is work done in collaboration with my ex-student and now long-term colleague Dr. J.D. Higley, who’s a senior scientist at the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, Alcoholism and Alcohol Abuse, it’s NIAAA. And Higley and others have devised a technique where they provide monkeys in their familiar social group or sometimes, in some studies, in strange situations, but typically in their own normal social group, and with the opportunity to participate in what you might call a monkey happy hour, where for an hour a day over an extended period of weeks or longer, these monkeys have access, unlimited access to eight or nine percent alcohol solutions sweetened with Nutrasweet or aspartame, a non-alcoholic beverage sweetened with Nutrasweet or aspartame and plain tap water. So these monkeys are not fluid-deprived in any sense. And most monkeys do not, like most humans, don’t initially like the taste of alcohol; the sweetness. And under these circumstances some monkeys will consume considerably more alcohol than will others. Again, in exactly the same situation.  

And what we found is that there are both genetic factors and early experience factors that predispose some monkeys to consume more alcohol than do others. And we also see interactions between these genetic and environmental effects. So most spectacularly, what we have been able to demonstrate is that monkeys who carry a particular variant of the serotonin transporter gene, what we call the short allele version of that gene, if they are peer-reared, these monkeys drink alcohol to excess. But if they have good mothers, those monkeys with the same short allele, short version of the serotonin transporter gene, actually consume less alcohol than do others in their peer group. So what appears to be a genetic risk factor for excessive alcohol consumption for individuals with poor early environments or less than optimal early environments, may actually be a genetic protective factor for individuals who carry the same gene but who have very good early experiences. And this is a perfect example of what I would call the gene-environment interaction.